Mumbai: Coalition of love & peace

One of Mumbai’s most visited, and equally revered, shrines has begun building a coalition of peace and harmony with other places of worship across the city. Mahim Dargah has opened talks with temples, churches, gurdwaras and Buddhist shrines to bring together moderate voices as a buffer against the cacophony of hate and divisiveness. A proposal to form this alliance --which will not only be activated in a crisis, but will work all year long to build inter-religious tolerance -- will reach all big and small places of worship in Mumbai tomorrow. The trouble in France and the reactions to it all over the world – posters of President Macron stuck to the ground on Mohammed Ali Road had to be removed by the police – has added a new sense of urgency to the initiative.

Managing Trustee, Pir Makhdum Saheb Charitable Trust, Suhail Khandwani said the idea is to create a platform for like-minded people across all religions. “We have to explain and counsel people about the paramount importance of human life. In peace and harmony, we can all prosper and in strife we all suffer,” he said.

Khandwani said that almost 80 per cent of dargahs and masjids in Mumbai and the rest of the state are connected to Mahim dargah through sub-committees on education, medical health, security and maintenance. “I have had initial discussions with people who head temples and churches and Buddhist institutions and the response has been encouraging,” he said.

Sabir Sayed, Director, Information Technology at Mahim Dargah, said that the focus is to create a ready mechanism to push for peace and harmony whenever there is trouble. “And at the same time work all year round to bring people of different faiths together. We have proposed a course in religious studies. We will also curate a tour of all places of worship. People must interact and understand each other,” he said.

Father Nigel Barett, Spokesperson, Archdiocese of Bombay, said coalition of peace is a noble idea and should be endorsed. “I have yet to see the text of the proposal, but it is a welcome step because it is an attempt to unite people all around and anything that brings around the common good of humanity and blocks hatred is always welcome,” he said.

Aadesh Bandekar, Managing Trustee, Siddhi Vinayak Temple in Prabhadevi, said that he is yet to receive a copy of the proposal and would not comment before seeing it.

Rev. Ajahn Prashil Ratna Gautam, president, Sanghakaya Foundation, a leading Buddhist organisation in India, confirmed there have been talks with Mahim Dargah. “Across religions, there is no attempt to understand each other. We will conduct study programmes called peace education to know about each other’s religions. There will be exchange programmes where tours will be conducted to visit Buddhist monasteries, dargahs, temples, churches and learn about their rites and rituals. We will design a three-month syllabus for this,” he said.

There are also plans to install 20-feet tall, 4,000-kilo statue of peace. “After Corona, we will now focus on karuna (compassion) and when it comes to compassion, there is no religion,” he said.

MIDC signs MoUs worth Rs.34,850 cr

The Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation signed Memorandums of Understanding worth Rs.34,850 crore with 15 companies from India, Japan, Spain, Singapore and the UK. All firms have pledged to make investments in the state. The MOUs were signed in the presence of Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray, who attended his first major summit since the lockdown was imposed in March.

Pitched by the state government as Magnetic Maharashtra 2.0, this was the first mega MoU signing conclave of the Shiv Senaled MVA government. MIDC CEO P Anbalagan and Principal Secretary (Industries) Venugopal Reddy were also part of the event. The industries department is led by Shiv Sena minister Subhash Desai.

Officials said that despite the Covid-19 pandemic and the economic downturn, the investor sentiment is running high, and the MIDC has received proposals to the tune of Rs.35,000 crore in the data centres, logistics, oil and gas, auto, electrical and electronic sectors. The MoUs signed on Monday, though, were mostly for setting up data centres. Officials said this will create 23,182 new jobs for the state’s youth.

Some of the investors include Netmagic IT Services (Rs.10,555 crore), Adani Enterprises Ltd (Rs.5,000 crore), Singapore-based ESR India (Rs.4,500 crore), Colt from the UK (Rs.4,500 crore) in data centres at Navi Mumbai. Singapore’s Princeton Digital Group will also invest Rs 1,500 crore for setting up a data centre.

In the logistics sector, a total investment of Rs.3,000 crore, comprising Rs.1,000 crore from Malpani Warehousing is proposed at Chakan, Talegaon. Further, Japanese major Mitsubishi Electric will invest Rs.500 crore in electrical products and systems at Talegaon, while Bright Sino will invest Rs.200 crore in Raigad.

Officials said that the MIDC will fast-track the land requirement for these projects. “Around 900 acres are required for setting up these projects. Close to 600 acres have already been acquired,” the official said.

Terming the MoUs “very significant”, the CM said trust between the state government and investors is of prime importance. He said, “The last time, MoUs were signed in June, and almost 60 per cent of the work has been done. This is quite satisfying. I am proud of the industry department. I want to bring in more than Rs 1 lakh crore of investments.”

Anbalagan said, “We have had two MoU signing ceremonies during the lockdown. In June, we signed MoUs worth Rs.17,000 crore in the automobiles, petrochemicals, logistics, oil and electronics sectors.” He said the MoUs signed on Monday will lead to direct employment of 25,000 people.

Maharashtra gets 1st virtual court for traffic challan cases

A dedicated virtual court for traffic violations in Maharashtra has been inaugurated by Chief Justice of India S A Bobde, an initiative aimed at freeing up judicial officers in every district from the burden of routine cases involving challans.

The court, to be located in Katol near Nagpur, will be manned by a single judge who will have jurisdiction over the entire state. "Cases from across Maharashtra will be filed in this virtual court electronically,” said Justice Dhananjay Chandrachud. “A single judge sitting in Katol will adjudicate all the cases electronically. Violators can plead guilty and pay the fine by visiting vcourts.gov.in or choose the option to contest the case. If a violator decides to contest the case, then it will be assigned to the court in whose jurisdiction the traffic violation has taken place.”

The concept of virtual courts was popularised by the Supreme Court's E-Committee headed by Justice D Y Chandrachud. Delhi was the first to get virtual courts after traffic violations captured on cameras were sent to the owner of the offending vehicle. It not only stopped traffic police from harassing drivers but also helped the fine money go to the state instead of a portion lining the pockets of some corrupt traffic policemen.

Delhi with 110 lakh vehicles has now emerged as the traffic rule violations capital as the virtual court has received 27 lakh challans, one-third of which were compounded after payment of fines that totalled Rs.120 crore.

"Implementation of the virtual court concept has freed 19 judicial officers who now can handle litigation instead of taking up routine traffic violation cases," Justice Chandrachud said.

One virtual court each was set up in Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Haryana and Kerala during the lockdown. The virtual court in Kerala, which has as many vehicles as Delhi recorded barely 1,468 traffic violation cases and collected Rs.1.35 lakh in fines. TN’s virtual court received over 32,000 traffic challans and compounded offences on payment of fines, which totalled Rs.93 lakh.

Justice Chandrachud said the E-Committee could assign the task of running the virtual court to any judicial officer in Maharashtra. The task of compounding the offence on payment of fine can be performed from anywhere in the state as all work is done electronically by virtual mode, he added.

He said between January 1 to October 30, which included the seven months of nonphysical functioning of courts due to Covid-19, as many as 202.35 crore e-transactions were recorded on ecourt websites. Average etransactions for 304 days this year was 66.56 lakh per day.

It’s an October Like Never Before for Car Companies

 

Leading Indian carmakers are set to post record sales this festive season.

Sales of cars, sedans and sport utility vehicles have touched an all-time high in October on sustained demand for personal mobility solutions and healthy offtake in rural areas.

Dealerships had already built up inventory anticipating robust sales during Navratri, Dussehra and Diwali. Industry estimates that around 333,700 passenger vehicles were sold last month, a 17% increase from the 285,047 units in the year-ago period.

Prior to this, the highest ever wholesale of passenger vehicles — 310,047 units — was reported in September 2017, data from industry body Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers showed.

Automakers in India report dispatches from factories and not actual retail sales to customers. Market leaders Maruti Suzuki and Hyundai Motor India posted double-digit growth in sales. Volumes went up 17.6% to 163,656 units for Maruti Suzuki, while it rose 13% to a record 56,605 units for Hyundai in October.

Last week, Maruti Suzuki chairman RC Bhargava said passenger vehicle sales in the ongoing quarter should fare well given healthy traction during the festive season.

“October should be good in terms of production and sales. This year, Diwali is in November, so it should be alright. Carmakers go all out to minimise inventory with dealers in December. After that, hard to predict sales, once the impact of festivals and people wanting personal vehicles is over,” he said.

Tarun Garg, director (sales, marketing and service), Hyundai Motor India Ltd, said: “The October month sales performance has set a positive tone for overall business environment and we are confident that Hyundai will continue to strongly contribute towards sustainable growth of economy, community and all its stake holders.”

Homegrown auto maker Tata Motors is estimated to have increased sales by 79% to 23,600 units in October.

A Tata Motors spokesperson declined to confirm the sales numbers, but said, “We have seen good momentum continuing and month on month sales rising in October as well. In Navratri Dusshera, we recorded 103% growth in bookings and 90% growth in retails.”

Mahindra & Mahindra saw a marginal 1% increase in sales at 18,622 last month. Veejay Nakra, CEO (automotive division), M&M, said, “We are happy to achieve a growth of 4% in utility vehicles, despite certain supply constraints…For Mahindra, the festive season has started on a positive note with deliveries and bookings being higher than last year.”

Toyota Kirloskar Motor (TKM) sold 12,373 units last month, an increase of 4.3% over the 11,866 units sold in the corresponding period last year.

The company clocked a growth of 52% compared to the wholesales of 8,116 units registered in September. Orders stood even higher at 1.5X of wholesale volumes. Naveen Soni, senior V-P (sales and service), TKM, said, “October has been our best month so far since March. The festive season has proved to be bullish as we witness demand surging, month on month…The fact that our wholesales have been registering an average growth of close to 50% every month gives us confidence that the demand for bigger vehicles is rising too, with both the Innova Crysta and the Fortuner clocking promising figures compared to earlier months.”

October GST collection tops ₹1L cr

For the first time since February, GST collections topped ₹1 lakh crore in October, indicating that economic activity is headed to pre-Covid-19 levels.

The mop-up last month was 10.2% higher at ₹1,05,155 crore, making it the fastest rise since the 15.6% growth recorded in March 2019.

Collections in October are for September sales.

In October 2019, collections had dropped by over 5% to ₹95,380 crore. This time, domestic sales resulted in an 11% rise in collections, while those due to imports were estimated at 9%.

Last year, festival sales were bunched up in October due to Dussehra and Diwali.

This time, Dussehra sales took place in October, and the numbers will be clearer next month. Diwali sales are expected to be captured in the December numbers. The government sees the numbers as a pointer towards growth slowly coming back and strong signs of recovery in the months ahead.

However, some of the service sectors are still witnessing muted demand.

Finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman had said that there could be a strong bounce back next year after near zero growth during the current financial year.

Hizbul Mujahideen’s Kashmir chief killed

The security forces on Sunday killed Hizbul Mujahideen’s chief commander in Kashmir, Saifullah Mir alias Ghazi Haider, in an encounter on the outskirts of Srinagar.

Saifullah was also the last surviving militant from the Burhan Wani group. The 31-year-old was appointed as the new chief after Riyaz Naikoo was killed in May this year.

He was listed as A++ category terrorist by the security forces and was the most-wanted militant in J&K. He was involved in several attacks on the security forces. Inspector General of Police Kashmir range Vijay Kumar said that Saifullah was gunned down in Rangreth area of Srinagar district.

A suspect arrested from the site is being questioned, he said. Kumar said the police had received information that Saifullah had come to Srinagar district from south Kashmir and was hiding in a house.

Kashmir police chief said that on the basis of a specific lead, joint teams of police and CRPF laid a cordon at Rangreth area and later army also joined in the operation.

Later addressing a press conference, Director General of Police Dilbag Singh said Mir, a resident of Malangpora village in Pulwama district, was active since October 2014 and was associated with slain HM commander Burhan Wani for a long time.

He said Mir was one of the dreaded militants even before taking the command of the outfit.

Mir had killed many innocent people including three policemen, Singh said. He was behind the killing of two truck drivers immediately after the abrogation of Article 370. He attacked a Sarpanch in Kulgam recently but he survived the attack.

“He also had a hand in the killing of three BJP workers in Kulgam earlier this week. He is involved in over a dozen terror cases and has killed over half-a-dozen people. He was also involved in harming several people and destroying government property, as well as involved in several grenade attacks,” the DGP said.

The police chief said the security agencies were tracking the HM commander's movement from south Kashmir towards Srinagar for the last two days. Singh said the security forces have killed over 200 militants this year so far. “This includes about 190 militants in the valley and the rest in the Jammu region,” he said.

Free coronavirus vaccine promise not violation of poll code : EC

The BJP’s promise of providing free coronavirus vaccine in its manifesto for the Bihar assembly polls is not violative of the provisions of the model code, the Election Commission has held.

Responding to a complaint by RTI activist Saket Gokhale, the commission said it has found no violation of the provisions of the model code in the issue.

Gokhale had claimed that the promise is discriminatory and a misuse of powers by the central government during elections.

According to sources, the commission cited certain guidelines for election manifestos contained in Part VIII of the Model Code of Conduct to conclude that the free vaccine promise was not violative of it.

“The Directive Principles of State Policy enshrined in the Constitution enjoin upon the State to frame various welfare measures for the citizens and therefore there can be no objection to the promise of such welfare in election manifesto,” one of the provisions quoted by the EC said.